After finding medical records mixed in with a real estate transaction, single mom Erin Brockovich and an attorney team together to find that power company PG&E was covering up a massive chromium contamination of a small California town, lying to residents, and buying out their property to keep them quiet.

Sometimes we as
critics judge a film to harshly. Admit it. We sometimes look at a film
and question its credibility but take a look at life. Who would have
thought that we would ever see a trial like that of the famous O.J.
Simpson case. If a script like that, with the events depicted in that
trial had been offered to the studios for consideration, it would have
been thrown in the garbage. I constantly heard it in the media that no
script could be written this way, but truth, as they say, is sometimes
stranger than fiction. So how then does a borderline burn out with
three kids bring a multi billion dollar corporation to its knees and
rake in two million dollars from the case herself. That's the question
you'll be following in 'Erin Brockovich', a truly great film with the
best performance of Julia Roberts' career. First of all, this is a real
life character. Erin Brockovich obtained a job as a clerk for a bottom
of the heap law firm and helped in a case where a corporate injustice
struck people down in the prime of their lives. It opens as we see Erin
in a car accident and her representation is carried out by a law firm
headed by a man named Ed Masry (Albert Finney). Finney is great in this
role. He takes on an American accent and like his fellow countrymen
from the UK who have tried it, such as Michael Caine, Bob Hoskins and
Kenneth Branagh, he is great at it. Erin loses her case and is stuck
with large medical bills. She hounds Ed's law firm to give her a job
and won't leave until she has one. Her mannerisms in court, that of a
highly profane nature, helped her lose her case but her firey p*** and
vinegar attitude is sorely needed when she investigates a case that the
law firm is considering handling. A property case comes to her
attention and she finds that the water pollution around it, carried out
by the neglect of a billion dollar corporation, can infect a person's
DNA to the extent of causing death. This movie comes a little more than
a year after 1998's 'A Civil Action' entertained audiences in a much
more subtle manner with similar subject matter but 'Erin Brockovich'
has a protagonist who is determined to win. She uses her feminine ways,
such as short dresses and skirts and plenty of cleavage to get the
information she wants from men. I haven't really cared for Steven
Soderbergh's films much over the years. His over rated effort 'Out of
Sight' from 1998 was too stilted to truly enjoy with some actors in
roles way over their heads. 1989's 'Sex. Lies and Videotape' and last
year's 'The Limey' are probably his best films but 'Erin Brockovich' is
a close rival to these films for Soderbergh. The real beauty of the
film is the way Soderbergh pays close attention to detail and makes
every scene extremely believable in the pursuit of a small law firm
taking on a gigantic monster of a company and doing a good job of it.
It shouldn't be too hard to figure out the ending of the film but films
of this nature rarely end any other way, especially with big Hollywood
stars not wanting to cheat their fans but I'm still not giving away the
extraordinary details of how the case ends up. Erin involves herself
with a guy named George (Aaron Eckhart), and this needless romantic sub
plot is probably what prevents the movie from earning a four star
rating but you can't have everything I suppose. The film also boasts
performances from actors such as Peter Coyote, Conchata Ferrell, and
Marg Helgenberger and these roles could help their careers greatly.
With all of the advanced press Julia Roberts has been getting for this
film, I can't leave this review without mentioning the excellent work
by Albert Finney who should be Oscar nominated if Roberts is and both
of them certainly deserve it at this point. Finney is a guy who has
been nominated four times the Oscar between 1963 and 1984 and all of
the nominations have come in leading roles. His first role was in
1960's 'Saturday Night and Sunday Morning' and David Lean wanted Finney
for the leading Peter O'Toole part in 'Lawrence of Arabia'. He is one
of the most under rated of the British actors who makes a great
comeback in this movie. Julia Roberts proves here that she earns every
penny of her salary and audiences can revel in the fact that with so
many disappointments early in 2000, this film is one of the early year
gems that will carry it's quality to next year's Oscar ceremonies.
Let's keep our fingers crossed. Visit FILM FOLLOW-UP by Walter Frith

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